Music events on campus; free and entertaining.

I'm not usually one to go to many events on campus (if at all) but a friend of mine (violinist Shannon Stott) asked if I wished to attend a concert she was performing at this past Friday night at Hawkins Hall. I decided to go, and I am glad I did.

The Sinfonia Chamber Ensemble Concert, directed by Elizabeth Gorevic, took place in the E. Glenn Glitz Auditorium. Shannon Stott, Concertmaster, lead the way, and the whole concert sounded wonderful. There were four main acts in the program, pieces by J.S Bach, John Williams, Edward Grieg, and Peter Warlock.

I enjoyed each one, especially the one by John Williams. The sound of the concert was really unique, I have not been to many in my life so experiencing something with all string instruments was something pretty neat. I would definitely recommend people to attend a similar concert sometime, given the opportunity.

Bearded Dragons, and other such exotic animals.

After hanging out with a friend who owns a Bearded Dragon for the past couple weeks, I gotta say, I've grown kinda fond of the little lizard.

It's kind of strange. I would usually never consider owning a pet other than a cat or dog, something that is affectionate (and fluffy) and enjoys having human attention. However, just chilling with the lizard is pretty cool. Sort of just clings to you, licks things to see what they are, and then wanders until she finds another comfy, dark spot.

I have never known anyone who owned something other than a cat, dog, or fish before, so hanging out around a lizard has been a neat experience. I sort of want to see what hanging out with a snake is like, I might try to do that soon.

I recently found out our friendly neighbourhood David Beirne (check out his blog!) has owned a Tarantula before. Have any of you owned some exotic pets? Any interesting experiences?

Good snacks for a person who doesn't like healthy.

So the past few weeks, I have been eating a LOT of popcorn.

Watching movies and TV shows on netflix is just better with popcorn, and as a whole, it is not an awful snack. It is better than potato chips or cookies.

However, it is a snack that becomes boring. I've been looking for new ideas for stuff to eat while watching movies. A snack that tastes good, but also won't destroy my digestive system. Popcorn seems to fulfil both of those things rather well.

Anyone have a snack they swear by during movie time?

This week in video games..holy crap.

So I know I have done a few posts about video games, but this week was really something. As an employee of GameStop, I know first hand how much advertising is put into the games that come out at this time of year, and how the developers push them back to maximize sales. This week was a little more crazy than usual.

I worked two midnight releases (an event were we stay open until midnight to release a new game). Usually, we only do them every once and a while, and only for really big games (Call of Duty, for example). But within these past couple of months, we have already done about five, and this week had two in one week!

Now I don't usually mind midnight releases, and I expected the first one for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 to be huge, many people of all ages play Call of Duty. And it was. At midnight, and through about 12:30, we sold over 200 copies of the game to some very eager people. It was a fun night though, we had lots of freebies to give out, and throwing out hats and dogtags to the crowd randomly was like watching seagulls fight over fish. Entertaining stuff.

Later on in the week, we had a second midnight release for the fifth game in The Elder Scrolls series, Skyrim. Now, like I said, I expected Modern Warfare 3 to be huge, but for Skyrim (an Action/RPG/Adventure), I expected maybe 25-30 people. Boy was I wrong. By the time it hit midnight, there were over 100 people at the mall, and the crowd was actually worse than Call of Duty's. Whereas Call of Duty had a ton of people, with ages ranging from 5-60, the Skyrim crowd was a much smaller gap (mostly 20-30 I would say) and I expected them to be pretty behaved, but some of them got a little rowdy, making the night a little annoying.

Overall though, it wasn't so bad. People got their games, I got paid, and I myself enjoyed some Call of Duty. I still can't believe how many games are pushed out for the holidays, but I suppose its the way its going to be when there is money to be made.

A movie that hit home; Toy Story 3

I suppose this seems pretty un-original, as my last couple of blog posts were about movies and such, but I really wanted to write a bit about another movie I just watched for I think the fifth time now: Toy Story 3

Toy Story is a series that I can easily say is my favorite of all time. When the first film came out in 1995 (boy do I feel old), it was something that really got me as a kid; a movie that had an extremely new style of animation, had a funny story, and was about toys, which (as I think most kids were into) was really cool to see. When my parents got it for me on VHS, I have no idea how it survived so many plays and rewinds in the VCR. When the sequel came out (1999), it was as amazing as the first, the new characters mixed well with the old, and the story line even grander. I could not wait for Toy Story 3.

However, Toy Story 3 was a long, long ways off. I would be waiting until June of 2010 to finally see it, and when I did, it was a pretty amazing experience. Our main character, Andy, who was a kid playing with his toys like I was, was now off to college. The family dog, Buster, first introduced in Toy Story 2 as a loving, rascal of a puppy, was now old and just barely moving.

Pixar had done it again, I was sucked into the movie seeing those two characters (along with his mother and sister) all grown up, as if they had been growing up in their own world like I had over the years. After the movie, it brought back memories of my childhood, its not common for any movie to really make me think too hard, but Toy Story 3 sure did.

Are there any movies or television shows that hit home with you or made you think about life at all?

This week in Netflix Part 2; a strange and awesome movie

So I decided to split up the stuff I enjoyed on Netflix into two posts. With this one, I would shortly like to review the latest concoction by Sacha Baron Cohen, Brüno.

Cohen's first project, Borat, was a film that was the news of my high school for a week or so. A strange film about a guy from Kazakhstan coming to America to make a documentary. A film that many seemed to love or hate (me with the former), I was not sure what to expect from Bruno. What I got was another hilarious film, which might have been a little more funny due to the fact I was a little buzzed. A gay guy from Australia looking to make it big in America, the film contained the same amount of stupid humour, male genitalia, and controversial topics as Borat, and watching the life of someone who tries to fit into American culture, and sticks out so much, is extremely entertaining for me. If you are a fan of said humour mentioned above, give Bruno a shot. I also look forward to The Dictator, Cohen's next project.

This week in Netflix Part 1; a short review of a show I watched growing up

So these past couple weeks I have been watching quite a wide array of things on the television (always a good use of my time) and I figured as something to write about I could review some of the stuff I have watched. I'll start with one of my favourite TV shows from my childhood: Malcolm in the Middle.

Malcolm in the Middle is one of the very few shows that I actually enjoyed growing up (we only had 5 channels, no satellite or cable!). A show about a crazy family, consisting of four out of control sons (Malcolm, Dewey, Reese, and Francis) of the two parents who are also crazy in their out right: Hal and Lois. The show is mainly a sitcom that I could recommend for pretty much anyone teenager or older. A series about the lives of each of the brothers, how they never get along, the many ways in which they drive their parents up a wall, and how Lois and Hal can never seem to control them. While each of the episodes usually has something awful happen (usually to the whole family) they each end on a pretty good note, which I enjoy. If you haven't heard of it before, give it a shot if you enjoy comedy.

All Hallows' Eve, what's everyone up to this year?

For me, not too much. Last year I went and did stuff for the holiday of Halloween, trick or treating, all that fun stuff, but this year I don't seem to be into it.

From what I've gathered, a lot of college students are taking it as dress up, but instead of candy replace that with alcohol, and you got your college halloween party.

About the only things I will be doing are helping hand out candy to the kids, maybe a pumpkin carving, and possibly watching Nightmare Before Christmas (sort of a tradition..sort of). I really enjoy the sound track from the movie, especially "Nightmare Revisited", made a couple of years ago.



(Above: Kidnap the Sandy Claws from The Nightmare Before Christmas, cover by KoЯn from the Nightmare Revisted soundtrack)

What sort of activities are you up to this year?

Open Mic @ The Monopole: a short summary.

For the past couple weeks now, I have attended the Open Mic events on Wednesday nights at the Monopole. I'm usually not the sort of person to go to things like that but a couple friends who play locally (look up Maps of Cartographers!) asked if I wanted to go and I figured, what the heck, I could use some different music.

The first thing I liked about the Monopole before the music even started was the atmosphere. It is a little cramped, and definitely one of the older buildings in Plattsburgh, but it has a nice, homey feel to it. I feel I could just hang out there for a while and not feel like I would have to leave. The bar was neatly set up, the food I tried there was good, and the prices were not bad at all.

But onto the music. The music, for the most part, I really enjoyed. There have been quite a few talented people I watched play the past couple times. The couple that stood out to me where the group I mainly went to see (Doomfuck) and another crazy couple of guys by the name of Niel Young and Crazy Hoss (I hope I spelled those correctly). Doomfuck had an epic set both times they played, with a great guitarist, bassist, violinist, drummer, and on the second night, even a guy on a synthesizer. The name fits them; the music had a very deep sound and a "doom" like feel.

Niel Young and Crazy Hoss, also having great music, put together a hilarious stage show with antics I would never have the guts to try myself. Getting "stabbed" on stage and taking and opening a banana out of your pants will be good memories.

Among Doomfuck and Niel Young/Crazy Hoss there were also many other talented people there on both nights, I thoroughly enjoyed my time at both, and I highly recommended attending Open Mic to everyone at least once (especially if you enjoy loud music!)

Drinking and getting drunk; have I missed out on much?

So up until recently in life, I really was not a person who alcohol pretty much at all. I suppose it could be considered pretty damn weird, since I've been 21 for a while now and I've been in college for almost 3 and a 1/2 years, you would think I would have gotten smashed a few times already. But I guess that wasn't for me.

Now I know some people who may come across this post have indeed probably gotten really smashed themselves. What I am asking here is; what is the appeal of it? I notice alcohol definitely puts me in a better attitude, makes everything seem a little less problematic/things more funny than they probably are, etc. But I haven't found myself really wanting to get stupid drunk. Have I been missing out?

A blizzard during winter; using templates in Flash.

The image below, created in Flash, was done during our midterm exam on Monday, October 17th. We all learned how to use a background image correctly, and how to give it a good message and even add some filters to it (such as the drop shadow below).

Here is the SWF Version of the file at this link.

Running from your problems; is there ever a best way?

The past..3 weeks to almost a month or so, I've dealt with shit I never saw coming anytime soon. To cut things short and not make this a huge myspace/facebook rant, the relationship I was in for 3 years came to an abrupt stop, and I was dropped in favor of somebody else. I've been through, excuse the cliche phrase, what feels like hell and back. So what have I been doing? Running.

Unfortunately, at this time, my living situation permits me to be living next to my now ex, and that's just no good. Running away from the place has been probably not the best idea, but finding new friends to hang out with and things to do has also not been such a bad experience in it self. I've been big into listening lots of music again (thank you Korn for always relating with my anger), and either being distracted by homework, video games, or friends has been allowing me to forget.



*Above: Second released song from Korn's next album The Path of Totality, Narcissistic Cannibal (featuring Skrillex and Kill the Noise).

The is the first big break up I've ever had to experience, and I'm sure I'm not the only one who has had to deal with stuff like this. What do you find your best escape to me? Not even just anything like this, but for any sort of problems.

Getting fired for trying to do my job?

So I've been talking with some friends since I've been back home for Columbus Break about the company we work for (GameStop). Apparently, as of recent, the company has started what they call "The 8 Week Plan". For 8 weeks, as an employee of the retailer, you MUST improve your numbers for sales (selling our discount card, etc.) or else you will get fired.

Now, I have worked in the company for years, and to me, this sounded like another scare tactic. We have been told before we would get "coachings", lose our jobs, have 3 warnings, etc. I had heard it all before. Until now though; my friend mentioned that I guy I used to work with actually got fired from his job by this program. A guy that I knew always tried to do his job, and do it well, and was also apparently working a ton of overtime.

Now I know being in retail, you have to be good at selling stuff. It's the way the job is. I have always been great at selling video games (it's easy when your favorite hobby is what you sell) however, there is only so much customers really want to buy. We do not get any acknowledgement as employees for however much we manage to sell to the customer aside from 2 things (game reserves and discount card subscriptions).

So, even if I sold a customer 5 new games, AND they filled out the customer service survey and rated me as excellent, I would still be a bad employee if I did not get either of the above mentioned items. Especially in an area like Plattsburgh, were Canadian customers will not want an American subscription (you need a US address) and will not reserve games (again, they would reserve them in Canada).

I doubt much will happen, I have been doing better at my job since we last got warned to do better (pretty much the whole store did). However, knowing a guy I used to work with got fired for just trying to do his job, just sucks in my mind.

Have you worked in retail before? Anyone else in another type of job been in a similar situation?

Korn to release "The Path Of Totality" in December

In one of my other recent blog posts about music, I stated Korn as my number one band. Their next album, The Path of Totality, is slated to hit December 6th, and I could not be any happier at the news of this.


Recently, Korn did a collaboration with dubstep artist Skrillex. I heard about the pairing before the single came out (titled "Get Up") and at first, I was a little worried. Korn is a band who has always tried new things in the past, but never a full album collaboration, let alone with an artist from a whole different genre of music. However, after hearing Get Up, I cannot wait to hear the rest of the album.



Above: Korn & Skrillex, "Get Up"


I have never really heard dubstep before this. I know that it has gained a huge following the past couple years, especially from guys like Skrillex, so Korn will definitely be expanding their audience with this. Stuff like this is why I love Korn, every time they have done something new I have enjoyed it, from Untouchables to See You on the Other Side. I will await the albums next single (Narcissistic Cannibal) to be put on radio later this October, and I'm sure enjoy it just as much, if not more, than Get Up.

Anyone happen to be a fan of dubstep? I realize now how catchy it can be, and have been listening to some more of Skrillex's stuff lately.

Status Update

So today after another six hour shift at the ol' job, I'm pretty exhausted.

Do I get to relax for the rest of my Sunday however? Not even close. I suppose I ask for it, being a college student and having a part time job, I should try to get my homework done sooner or something, but it's definitely hard wanting to do homework after a busy day at work.

I guess this sounds more like something you would see on facebook, as I'm more complaining than talking about anything important, but I'm interested to see what you other guys and gals in the class think about having a job while going to college.

I know a couple friends over the years had full time jobs while taking a lot of credits, and I feel like I shouldn't even complain in comparison to them. However, I also noticed their overall ability to do well in college seemed to just drop; they could just not keep up. With my part-time job, sometimes it can be difficult to get homework done when you don't have those nice weekend days off to cram all the homework into (I miss that), but at the same time, it's definitely nice having a little extra change in my pocket.

How do you guys and gals feel about it? Do you have a part-time/full time job? Do you feel it affects your abilities to do well in school? Maybe I just need to balance my time better (something a procrastinator like me will probably never learn).

Cats vs Dogs; which side are you on?

Heres another story that begins with "when I was growing up" (or something similar).


Growing up, I never had many pets at all for a long time. My family apparently owned a couple cats when I was a wee child (2/3), and the home videos obviously show me there playing with them, but I don't remember them at all. The first pets I do remember having were fish, and while neat, they were also kinda boring, and the fish tank exploding all over the house wasn't all the great of an experience.

After moving into our current house, and being there for 11 years, we have acquired first a cat (Chloe) our black lab (Jackson) and another cat we adopted (Peanut). Each has been an amazing pet.

I find pets like cats and dogs to be an amazing thing to have, I would think that any family would want one around. They are great companions, never complain, will always have the time to listen to you, and all you gotta do is clean up after them and feed them. The rest is just play time, or for cats, sleep time.

I'm definitely a cat guy though. Don't get me wrong, I love my black lab more than anything, but cats are just something else. I like how calm and lazy they always are, how hyper they can be when they want to play, and just how fluffy they are.



Above: Maru, my favorite internet cat.


So, are you a dog or cat person? Do you like pets? Ever had any yourself?

Music, why do you enjoy what you listen to?

So this week, I would like to do an article on music (I am a digital media major, so music is probably something I should be thinking about. However, until the middle/high-school years of my life, I never really listened to music; I just didn't have anything I was really interested in. Time went on, friends introduced to me bands like System of a Down and the Offspring, and from that time on I have always loved metal music for the most part.

I guess I would say it was between my Sophomore and Senior years of high school that I found my genre I really enjoy (before then it was pretty much listening to what people said was good). Alternative/Heavy Metal is my genre of choice, I enjoy catchy riffs, loud guitars, boomy bass, and deep, angry voices (for the most part, the Offspring is still sweet).

Pic above: The album from Korn (my favorite band) that includes my favorite song (Got the Life).

So that's pretty much all for this one. What is your favorite Genre? Band? (Least favorite?) What are the reasons you enjoy what you listen to?

Need for Speed: Our obsession with fast cars.

So I just got done watching a new episode of Top Gear tonight (a show where a group of guys does crazy things with cars, old and new, usually involving pushing them to their limits.

I was never really into cars growing up, fast or slow, and I never really understood why people liked some cars so much (such as the Corvette or Ferrari). I always thought it was kinda silly, and that guys where just things to get to Point B from Point A.

Now that I am older though, and I have had some driving experience myself, things have changed. A few times on the road I have felt that sense of a need for speed, wanting to see how fast I could go (never did, especially not in my parents Honda Pilot SUV), and I can see now why people love fast cars and wanting to drive fast: its a supreme feeling of power.

A few years ago, my uncle took me out in his 78' Camaro, tuned for drag racing (the thing sounded like a jet engine) and I still remember the front end of the car being in the air for a good couple seconds why going over a hill when he gunned it. It was a scary yet amazing experience. Feeling and hearing the engine roar from 0 to 60 is something that just cannot be put into words.

Tonight's episode of Top Gear pitted one of my favorite fast cars (the Subaru Impreza) against a Dirt Bike on an off road race through the desert. The race was really neat to watch, and if I ever had the chance I know I would love to race a car like that around (though I know that's an awful idea and I'm sure I would crash).

Keeping with the trend of my blog, I suppose that's the main reason why realistic racing video games are so popular; it gives the everyday Joe like me a chance to take out that $100,000 dollar Corvette and go as fast as you can in a simulated environment (I can't wait for Forza Motorsport 4)!

Have you ever felt that sense of power behind the wheel? Ever put the petal to the medal yourself? Anyone have any other thoughts as to why we love fast cars?

Black Friday - The Bane of my Existence.

I am getting somewhat sick of video game companies doing the same thing each year: holding back all of their games until the holiday season.

I understand why they do it, but it sometimes just seems like a wasted effort.

Each year, a ton of new video games are released around the same 3 to 4 week schedule, from late October to mid November, to get in on the holiday rush. Each year, I think "Wow, so many amazing games are coming out, next year will NEVER be able to top this.

Yet sure enough, this year I'm looking at the releases coming up, and I'm like "damn it". Just listing the big titles all coming out off of the top of my head, this is what I got:

Multi-system releases:
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3
Battlefield 3
Dark Souls
Elder Scrolls: Skyrim
Batman: Arkham City
Assassin's Creed: Revelations
Ultimate Marvel vs Capcom 3

Xbox 360 releases:
Halo Combat Evolved: Anniversary Collection
Forza 4

Playstation 3 releases:
Ratchet and Clank: All 4 One
Uncharted 3 Drakes Deception

Nintendo Wii releases:
Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword
Kirby: Return to Dreamland



All of these are games I am thoroughly interested in (luckily I don't have a PS3, so I can avoid those), and each of these games look to be AAA titles, mega sellers.

Pic above: My wallet after all of these games come out.


What slightly puzzles me but also makes sense: why do all of these games come out at the same time? I know its because people spend more money around that time of year (especially with getting ready for Christmas and all of the Black Friday deals). At the same time though, why do they all want to compete with each other? Especially with Call of Duty, a series that has outsold itself year after year, with millions of copies sold on release day.

Take the recent game Dead Island. That game was not a triple A title by any means, but it came out at the beginning of September, during what I call a "big title drought", where there haven't been any big games that came out in a while. What happened? The game, why not amazing, sold like hotcakes and was hard to keep in stock at the GameStop I work at.

I guess I am just wishing that game developers would try to spread the games out more throughout the year (thank you Microsoft for allowing Gears of War 3 to come out this Tuesday!) but it's really not up to them; it's up to the publishers. And what do they only care about? Money.

America and Zombies, whats up with that?

-Trailer for the "Rezzurection" download content for Call of Duty Black Ops.

Blogger and classmate David Beirne wrote about the recently released video game "Dead Island", which in turn inspired me to write a little about zombies myself: why are they so popular?

I guess it's just another form of horror. Horror flicks have always been popular in America, and zombies are just one of the many monsters haunting those films.

Zombies have definitely not been in just film, though. Resident Evil has been a staple video game series that has been around since I was a child, and has evolved on it's own with the times. Nowadays, we got a bunch of zombie games, all with different play styles (some fast, some slow, usually having some big boss zombies thrown into the mix).

Zombies are even one of my favorite creatures in the card game "Magic: The Gathering", a trading card game based around defeating your opponent with sorcery.

I think it is fair to say that zombies may be America's most popular creature of horror at the moment. In the past it might have been aliens or vampires (definitely not vampires right now..) but for now zombies it is. What will be our next favorite creature of the night? I'm not too sure. As it is, I will accept and enjoy our zombies, in all of their shapes and sizes (I'm sure they have many great smells as well).

Texting while Driving; Dancing with Death

Today I played a short flash game on the New York Times webpage, which was created as a test for people to really see how texting while driving can and will reduce your reaction time to be able to maneuver correctly.

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2009/07/19/technology/20090719-driving-game.html

I do not think the game accurately portrayed what an actual situation of driving is even remotely like.  The game was fairly easy once you were able to switch lanes way before your car got to the correct gate, which was even easier since the gate you had to go in was color coded green.  In real life, there would be tons of cars around, and all the gates (assuming this was supposed to be like a toll booth) would look pretty similar.

While I do not think the game is accurate, it does show you the basic idea that doing something such as texting, while driving, will make you slower to react.  I myself have only ever texted once or twice while driving, and if I did, it was probably while I was stopped at a train crossing or traffic jam, as it is just too dangerous.  Just once second of looking away from the road could lead to any number of disasters, so reducing the amount of distractions you have (and a cellphone is a pretty big distraction) is what I try to do mostly (though I suppose the radio is fine, it doesn't take your eyes off the road).  Even the radio can be a problem sometimes, I don't know how some people manage to keep their hearing when the put the radio up to max volume (usually along with maximum bass) and that can be dangerous to others as well (you can't hear cops/firetrucks/ambulance trying to move people to the side).

Enough with the rambling though.  The one thing about this game that was interesting was the results.  Not the gates I missed or my slower reaction time, but that damned women.  I did not see the women (colored the same as the road as to make it more difficult).  Which made me wonder if she was off to the side, did I hit her, or what.  I don't know what happened, but there was some women I missed.  If I hadn't been texting, I'm almost sure I would have noticed her, so I gotta give the game some credit for that.  You might miss something if you text, and that could be a fatal mistake.

Anyone else play the game?  I'm interested to see what people think of it.